FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

SEEDBED PUBLISHING AND FIRST FRUITS PRESS ANNOUNCE THEIR COLLABORATION IN PROVIDING ONLINE RESOURCES FOR THE GLOBAL CHURCH.

Wilmore, Kentucky, July 1, 2013 – Seedbed.com is now linking to First Fruits Press, an open access press of Asbury Theological Seminary. The First-Fruits Collection includes academic books and papers, devotional works, and new resources, along with journals, such as The Asbury Journal for free download on your computer or mobile devices. View them in our store.

Seedbed Chief, J.D. Walt and Director of Library Services, Paul Tippey announced the collaboration. J.D. Walt, noted, “From its inception, Seedbed has envisioned the release of a steady stream of vintage resources from the treasury of the Wesleyan Holiness movement. We are thankful to the First-Fruits Press of the B.L. Fisher Library for their generosity in sharing the collection with the Seedbed community.”

Paul Tippey, Director of Library Services at Asbury Theological Seminary, remarked, “We have always looked forward to a close working relationship with Seedbed. First Fruits has been active for over a year and we believe Seedbed will help give these important resources exposure to multiple new audiences. Since the mission of the library is to provide resources, this is a natural step from simply providing materials to publishing them as well.”

Through a generous donor gift, the Seminary acquired a state of the art Kirtas Scanner. With this scanner the First Fruits Press began a project to digitize and re-release historic material from the Wesleyan Holiness movement, along with back issues of The Asbury Journal. The use of online publishing has also provided the opportunity to release out-of-print material by faculty and new materials by partnering with faculty and other academic organizations. “Many parts of the Global Church are in need of free online resources, both historic materials for research purposes and current materials for a modern theological education. In some parts of the world, books are hard to get or preserve. Modern technology helps us cut costs and deal with other issues like weather and insects,” added Dr. Robert Danielson, the director of First-Fruits Press. The entirety of First Fruits publications can be found at http://place.asburyseminary.edu/firstfruits/.

The First Fruits Collection currently contains around 38 titles with works by H.C. Morrison, Frank Stanger, Howard Snyder, and the very popular Wesley Bibliography by Kenneth Collins (now in its second edition and only available on First Fruits Press). There are also 18 audio recordings including such names as Albert Outler and Bishop Stephen Neill, over 24 academic papers and ten years of back issues of The Asbury Journal. There are currently around 50 more items in preparation for release by next year with the promise of many more to come.